THOMAS CRAEMER, PH.D.

Valuation & Policy Team Co-Lead

   Thomas Craemer obtained a political science doctorate in 2001 from the University of Tübingen in his native Germany, and a PhD from Stony Brook University, New York, in 2005. He teaches at the University of Connecticut’s Department of Public Policy. Growing up in Germany, he learned about the German Holocaust in every high school subject and felt deeply ashamed. He was able to express his feelings to Holocaust survivor Mieciu Langer, who had retired from Israel to Germany. What gave Mieciu the confidence that Germany had changed? Thomas learned that Mieciu was a recipient of a Holocaust reparations pension.
   This experience motivated Thomas to conduct research on implicit racial attitudes and race-related policies in the United States, with a special focus on reparations for slavery and de jure racial discrimination. He published his research on the impact of explicit and implicit racial attitudes on public opinion regarding slavery reparations among others in Craemer, 2009, Framing Reparations, The Policy Studies Journal, 37(2), 275-298; and Craemer, 2009, Psychological ‘Self-Other Overlap’ and Support for Slavery Reparations, Social Science Research, 38: 668–680; and Craemer, 2024, Implicit Black Identification among White non-Hispanic Respondents and Support for Black Reparations, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 40, 657–671.
   In 2015, Thomas published his first article estimating losses to the enslaved and their descendants due to unpaid labor during U.S. slavery, titled Estimating Slavery Reparations: Present Value Comparisons of Historical Multigenerational Reparations Policies, Social Science Quarterly, 96(2): 639-655, which was widely cited in the media, including appearances in Full Frontal with Samantha Bee and United Shades of America with W. Kamau Bell. He presented his research at reparations conferences in the Gambia, at Tulane Law School, and in South Africa. Thomas has since expanded his research to address international reparations for the Transatlantic Slave Trade, as well as Reparations for European Colonialism in Africa. (Craemer, 2018, International Reparations for Slavery and the Slave Trade, Journal of Black Studies, 49(7): 694-713; Craemer, 2019, Comparative Analysis of Reparations for the Holocaust and for the Transatlantic Slave Tradem Review of Black Political Economy, 45(4), 299-324; and Craemer, 2023, Forensic Analysis of Reparations to Africa for Depredations Under European Colonialism, in Richard F. America (ed.), Accounting for Colonialism. Measuring Unjust Enrichment and Damages in Africa, Chapter 13 (pp. 253-293), Palgrave Macmillan / Springer Nature).
   Thomas has served as a pro-bono consultant for various reparations-related projects. Since 2017, he has consulted with the GU272 Isaac Hawkins Legacy group under the leadership of Attorney Georgia Goslee regarding reparations for 200 direct descendants of 272 enslaved people sold in 1838 by Georgetown University to save the institution from financial ruin.
   From 2019 to 2023 he consulted with the Reparations Planning Committee organized by Duke University Professor Dr. William Darity Jr. (serving as chair of the Wealth Subcommittee and co-publishing Craemer, Smith, Harrison, Logan, Bellamy, & Darity, 2020, Wealth Implications of Slavery and Racial Discrimination for African American Descendants of the Enslaved, Review of Black Political Economy, 47(3): 218-254; which was updated and reprinted in Darity, Mullen, & Hubbard, eds., The Black Reparations Project. University of California Press.
   From 2021 to 2023, he joined Dr. Darity, Kirsten Mullen, Dr. Kaycea Campbell, and Dr. William Spriggs on a 5-person expert team advising the California Task Force to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans. The team helped estimate losses to California residents descended from people enslaved in the United States caused by de jure discrimination in the State of California.
   In 2023, Thomas was invited by New York Senator Sanders to serve as the first chair of the History of New York Reparations Subcommittee for the “40 Acres and an EV” Coalition to support the New York State Community Commission on Reparations Remedies with loss estimates to Black New York State residents from slavery and de jure discrimination in the State of New York.